Techie
by Namikaze Artemis
Summary: During a chance trip to England when Tsuna was young, he befriends a young Spanner. This friendship brings about many changes in Tsuna- for one, his better grades in school. And of course, his new-found fascination with creating robots.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own KHR.**

**Oh, yes, a little guide:**

"_Word." _**- English**

"Word." **- Japanese**

Techie

Tsunayoshi Sawada was simply a normal, six-year old child.

And he would have stayed a normal child for a while longer, had Nana not won those tickets to England from a contest in a supermarket Nana frequented.

But she did: so, while Tsuna was finishing up his breakfast, Nana decided to tell him the good news.

"We're going to visit England!" Nana said cheerfully, not turning away from the sink where she was washing the dishes. She almost clapped her hands together, but remembered at the last moment that she was holding a dish in her hand.

Tsuna took a few moments to process this information- and to recall the approximate location of England.

"Huh? How come?" Tsuna exclaimed, dropping the chopsticks in his hand onto the floor. There had been no talk of England before this moment. Not to mention that in his six years of life, he hadn't yet gone on a vacation overseas.

"You see, Mama entered into this contest for a week long trip to England!" Nana explained. "Mama was really shocked when she won, because so many other people entered this contest too!"

"So we're going to England?" Tsuna said with a grin. He paused for a moment. "Wait, Mama, what's in England?"

"Mama isn't that sure either!" Nana laughed. Her eyes clouded for a moment. "I- Mama won three tickets, but Daddy isn't around that often, right? He has work to do. So it'll just be Tsuna-kun and I!"

Tsuna looked down at the rest of his food, then at the chopsticks he had dropped onto the floor. He decided against getting new ones, and simply brought his plates over to the sink.

"When are we going, Mama?" Tsuna asked, lifting up the plates for Nana to take. He was still too short to reach the counter.

"In six days," Nana answered, dutifully taking the plates. "You can brag about it to all your friends!"

_What friends? _Tsuna thought mournfully. He didn't voice his complaints, though: he didn't want to worry Mama.

Six days passed. Nana and Tsuna sat in front of their gate at the airport. As they sat, something important occurred to Tsuna.

"Mama… can you speak English?"

You must forgive Tsuna for not thinking of this before. He _was _only six, after all. Luckily, this was not a problem.

"Don't worry, Tsuna-kun," Nana said. "I took English classes all through school, and I've kept up with my skills occasionally. You never know when you might need to use English, after all! "

"That's amazing!" Tsuna exclaimed.

"But Tsuna-kun can't speak English, so you have to stay with Mama, okay?" Nana said.

"I can speak English!" Tsuna objected. "_Ha- hallo!"_

Nana let out a smile at that.

After a while, the two of them headed onto the plane. The plane trip took a long time, so Tsuna spent most of the time sleeping. Because of that, Tsuna's jet lag wasn't too bad- although it still prevented both Nana and him from doing much for the first day. They slept and attempted to understand the English TV.

But on the second day, they headed out to go shopping. Nana didn't want to go to any of the tourist traps straight out, because she was afraid Tsuna would get lost.

Then, Tsuna promptly got lost.

Panicking, he looked around desperately for his mother. Moving around in the crowd, he eventually was backed up against a bench.

"Mama! Kaa-chan!" Tsuna cried out.

"Kaa-chan?"

Tsuna flipped around to stare at a blond-haired child with a lollipop stuck in his mouth. He looked around the same age as Tsuna, and was sitting on the bench.

The kid took the lollipop out of his mouth and stared at him. Tsuna vaguely noted that the lollipop was red.

"_Kaa-chan… that's Japanese for Mom, isn't it?_" the child said. "_Are you lost too?_"

Tsuna stared at the child blankly.

The child frowned.

"_You don't speak English?_" he asked. His brows furrowed. "Uh… you are lost?"

Tsuna blinked.

"Yes," he answered.

"I'm Spanner," Spanner introduced himself. "You?"

"My name's Tsuna," Tsuna replied. "Have you seen Mama?"

"No. You see Mom?" Spanner asked in broken Japanese.

"… No?" Tsuna said hesitantly, not exactly sure what Spanner was saying. "Are you lost too?"

Spanner frowned, attempting to decipher Tsuna's words. Scratching his head, he eventually decided that Tsuna was asking if he was lost too.

"Yes," Spanner replied.

They stood in an awkward silence for a little while, simply scanning the people around them for their respective mothers.

"Um. That is, Spanner-kun, aren't you English?" Tsuna asked. "Why are you lost?"

"… I'm not from London," Spanner answered. "Lots of people."

"Tsuna-kun!"

Tsuna's eyes widened, his head whipping to and fro in search of his mother. He spotted her running towards him.

Nana stopped in front of Tsuna and placed her hands on her knees, breathing heavily. She looked up towards with a weak smile.

"Tsuna-kun, I told you to hold onto my hand," Nana gently chided. "Why did you let go?"

"Sorry, Mama," Tsuna apologized, not answering Nana's question. He didn't want to say that he let go because he saw an interesting toy.

Nana suddenly noticed the blond-haired boy next to Tsuna.

"Who's your friend?" Nana asked.

"He says that his name is Spanner," Tsuna said. "He speaks a little bit of Japanese. He's lost too!"

"What?" Nana's eyes widened. "_Where are your parents, Spanner?"_

"… _My mom is somewhere around here. She should be here soon, 'cause we… said to meet up here if I got lost._" Spanner answered. He decided against commenting on Nana's less-than-stellar accent.

Nana settled herself down on the desk next to Spanner. "_I can't just leave a child alone!"_

Spanner stuck his lollipop back into his mouth and shrugged. It was really none of the other woman's business, but she was free to sit where she wanted. It would be too much of a pain to try to convince her to leave, anyways.

"Tsuna-kun, you can sit next to Spanner!" Nana decided, shifting over to leave a space for Tsuna to sit.

"Eh?" Tsuna exclaimed. Nervously, he settled himself down next to Spanner.

Spanner glanced towards Tsuna and took his lollipop out of his mouth. "Do you like robots?"

"Robots?" Tsuna said in surprise.

"Japan's robots are…" Spanner frowned, not sure how to express his feelings in Japanese. _"Er… amazing._"

"Cool?" Tsuna suggested.

Spanner smiled, his eyes brightening. "Yes. Robots are… cool!"

"I've seen robots before, and they are pretty cool," Tsuna said, smiling at Spanner.

Spanner, encouraged by Tsuna's statement, went on and talked about all his favourite robots. He explained in detail the little mini robot he had managed to create the other day. Tsuna tried to understand what Spanner was saying, but Spanner's mediocre Japanese and Tsuna's little knowledge of the subject made conversation difficult. Tsuna resigned himself to smiling and nodding.

"…. Should…" Spanner frowned. "Uh, e-mail address?"

"E-mail address?" Tsuna said in confusion.

"_Spanner, thank goodness_!"

Both Tsuna and Spanner's heads shot up at the sound of Spanner's name. A blond-haired woman was running towards the bench they were sitting on. As she neared them, Tsuna noted the sweat that was steadily dripping from her forehead. Her clothing was loose enough that no sweat stains were noticeable, however.

"_Mother, you took a while," _Spanner said calmly, pushing himself off the bench. He nodded towards Nana and Tsuna. "_These people are Japanese tourists. He- Tsuna- was lost like me, and his mother wouldn't leave once she learned that I didn't have my parents with me."_

"_Why, really?" _Spanner's mother gave a smile towards Nana. "Thank you for staying with my child. I was quite panicked when he disappeared."

"No problem," Nana replied, somewhat surprised that the woman could speak Japanese. "I couldn't just leave a child by himself!"

"_You forgot that we were supposed to meet up here, didn't you," _Spanner sighed. It wasn't a question- it was merely a resigned statement.

Spanner's mother let out an embarrassed laugh.

After a few minutes of conversation, they discovered that they were planning to head to the same spot next. Spanner's mother- whose name turned out to be Nicoletta- explained that their family was going to be moving to Italy soon, so they were going around the tourist sites.

Spanner and Tsuna, on the other hand, continued on making conversation in halting Japanese. While this would have no immediate consequence, as soon as Tsuna got home, he would attempt to learn English as soon as possible.

Tsuna had no e-mail address; in fact, he had barely ever touched a computer. And as Spanner didn't particularly want to write letters, they were in a bit of trouble. They had no way to contact each other.

Spanner wanted to keep in contact because of mild interest in the brunet and the fact that he was Japanese- Tsuna wanted to keep in contact because Spanner was the first friend he had ever made.

However, Nana stepped in and gave Spanner her e-mail address. With a smile, she promised to make an e-mail address for Tsuna once they returned to Japan.

For the next few days, they headed out together. The two mothers got along reasonably well, and above all Tsuna and Spanner were becoming close friends. Spanner never got along that well with the people at his school, no one bothering to listen to him rambling on about robots. Tsuna not only listened, but put in his two cents once in a while.

Though, it was a pain speaking in Japanese. Spanner's mother used to have a Japanese friend, so she learned Japanese back in high school. She figured it couldn't hurt to teach Spanner how to speak Japanese, especially considering Spanner's love for robots. However, he was nowhere near fluent in the language.

The week passed all too quickly. Spanner and his mother left, promising to keep in contact, and Nana and Tsuna headed back to Japan.

Weeks passed.

Tsuna, impatient with the slow pace of his English classes at school, started to learn English outside of school with the help of Spanner and library books. While studying had been hard when he couldn't find the motivation, now that he desperately wanted to be able to communicate better with his first and only friend, he learned English at a crazy pace. Within the year, he managed to learn enough English to read Spanner's e-mails and send e-mails back in English.

His pronunciation was far from perfect- but nevertheless, his reading and writing skills were excellent.

If Tsuna's meeting with Spanner was the first turning point in his life, then Spanner's birthday present for Tsuna's seventh birthday would be the second.

The present arrived in a small wooden box the day before Tsuna's birthday. Knowing that it was Spanner's birthday gift for him, Tsuna held off from opening it until the next day. So, the moment his clock hit twelve, Tsuna quickly opened the box.

In the box was a robot. It was a simple, vaguely humanoid robot that was capable of walking around; nothing more, nothing less.

But Tsuna was _fascinated _with it.

He couldn't believe that Spanner- a boy the same age as him- could make something like this, powered only by a battery. For the next few weeks, he practically interrogated Spanner on the way robots work. Tsuna was rather disappointed to discover that it would take a while for him to be able to design and make robots by himself, but he kept at it.

As a result of his concentration on this technology, his marks in school remained low; Tsuna didn't care much about his marks, since he was still in elementary school. He was still the top in the class for English, however. His regular correspondence with Spanner made second grade English easy.

When Tsuna turned ten, he was finally capable of making his own robot. Proudly, he designed and created it and sent it to Spanner for his tenth birthday. Spanner was quite happy that a whole new topic of conversation had opened up.

Tsuna delved further into the world of robotics and technology. Nana was overjoyed that Tsuna seemed to enjoying his 'hobby' so much, she let Tsuna buy the materials he needed; provided they weren't too expensive. By the time he hit eleven, the only normal furniture in Tsuna's room were a desk (covered in rather atypical papers) and a small bed. His room was full of his tools and his robots.

Iemitsu made occasional visits, though his visits were spread farther and farther apart each time. And of course, as Tsuna grew older, he grew more doubtful of Iemitsu's 'working traffic at construction sites' story. He wanted to find out what his father _really _was doing.

His plan was set in motion by eating his dinner early one night, when Iemitsu was home. He suggested that Nana should have a nice dinner with Iemitsu without him. While Iemitsu was on his laptop, Tsuna brought Nana upstairs for her to drag Iemitsu down for dinner. Nana could be quite forceful when she wanted to be; Tsuna was counting on that.

Once Iemitsu was safely downstairs, Tsuna snuck into the room. He was overjoyed to discover that not only was the laptop on, it was _logged onto _Iemitsu's account. Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, Tsuna promptly poked around on the thing.

That was when he discovered that Iemitsu was most definitely not someone who worked traffic at construction sites. Why would someone working at a place like that have _coded _e-mails?

He quickly downloaded the contents of some of the e-mails onto a USB stick with the hope that he would eventually be able to decipher the code. Tsuna then returned the laptop to its former state and snuck out of the room.

Tsuna would eventually give up on the code and send it to Spanner to see if he had any luck.

Spanner spent over a year cracking the code. True, he didn't spend every waking moment on the code- far from it- but nevertheless, it shows that this code was quite the difficult one. Once he had managed to crack it, Spanner explained to Tsuna why he probably was unable to solve it: the emails were in Italian.

And that Tsuna's father was in the mafia.

Nana had told Tsuna that Iemitsu had gone away and became a star just the week before. Tsuna (incorrectly) read that to mean that Iemitsu was dead. He didn't mourn Iemitsu- truthfully, he barely knew him. He was curious about how it happened, but Nana wouldn't answer any of his questions. Not wanting to make her get depressed, he only asked a few questions before giving up.

If Iemitsu was in the mafia, then it answered about one of his questions: how Iemitsu died. It opened up a whole bunch of other questions, like why the hell Iemitsu was in the mafia. But Tsuna resigned himself to never knowing; if his father was killed because he was in the mafia, he most definitely didn't want to get involved.

Spanner also firmly warned Tsuna to stay away from the mafia.

That spring, Tsuna entered middle school. He actually started to try in his classes. With a bit of effort, his average grade jumped from 'almost-failing' to 'slightly above average'. (It helped that he was already doing pretty well in Math and Science). His elementary school nickname, 'Dame-Tsuna', was only used by some of his mean-spirited former classmates; and of course during his P.E. class.

Autumn came around. Tsuna remained cordial with his classmates, but had no real close friendships. He didn't mind: talking with Spanner was much more interesting than hanging out with his classmates, after all.

Tsuna was working on a new robot in his room when he met the baby. It was a sunny day, but Tsuna was cooped up in his room.

"It looks like you're just like your file says you are."

Tsuna ignored the voice and continued on working on his new robot.

Reborn, irritated, attempted to kick Tsuna to grab his attention. The key word here: attempted. Tsuna's hand shot out to slam onto bright green button on his desk. Metal bars shot up from the ceiling and around Reborn. However, Reborn wasn't the world's greatest hitman for nothing. Jumping back, he narrowly missed being captured in the makeshift cage.

Tsuna spared a glance towards Reborn. It was a death glare that could freeze Hell itself.

"Finishing. Robot," Tsuna spat out, his eyes flashing.

Reborn wisely decided to stay back. He recognized that aura; the techies in the Vongola often had that sort of aura when working on a project.

They could get quite violent when in that state. Reborn would prefer not to injure Tsuna, and so, he stayed back.

About a quarter of an hour later, Tsuna leaned back in his chair and grabbed his math textbook. The robot was saucer-shaped, capable of zipping around on the table. And, of course, one other thing.

"Solve for x where 2x= 9x – 28," Tsuna asked the robot.

A robotic voice, somewhat resembling Tsuna's voice, answered his question.

"4."

A small smile was pasted onto Tsuna's face. He read out another one of his homework questions.

"There are four people in a room. For every two people, there is a 50% chance that they are friends. Two people are connected if a),they are friends, b), a third person is friends with both of them, or c), they have different friends who are friends with each other. What is the probability that every pair of people in this room is connected?"

The robot made some electronic noises for a minute or two, before giving an answer.

"19/32."

The small smile grew into a wide grin that spread across Tsuna's face. Clicking on a button on the robot, he turned it off.

"Now you, baby." Tsuna turned around and looked at Reborn. "What do you want?"

"… you aren't going to ask why a baby can speak?" Reborn asked, somewhat incredulously.

"Obviously you can," Tsuna deadpanned. "I'm curious, yes, but I'm sure that you'll be more inclined to tell me why you act like an adult if I listen to what you have to say. So?"

Reborn shrugged. Whatever floated his boat, he supposed.

"I'm the world's greatest hitman. I was assigned by a certain man to train you to become an astounding mafia boss," Reborn explained. He looked over Tsuna with a critical eye. "Your case is far from hopeless, but it still will be difficult."

Tsuna blinked once. Twice. Thrice.

"Right," Tsuna groaned, rubbing his temple. "And I suppose I can't get out of this?"

"No," Reborn answered, resisting the urge to shoot the boy. There was no reason to. Yet.

"A certain man… is that my father you're talking about? I know he's part of the mafia, and it's possible that he's not actually dead…" Tsuna mused.

Reborn raised an eyebrow. "Your father? No. But he isn't dead… why would you think that? I saw him just the other day."

"… I see," Tsuna muttered. "That bas-"

"- anyways. " Reborn cut in. "I am and will be your home tutor for the next little while. I've seen your marks, and while they're good, they're not great..."

A cruel smile spread across Reborn's face.

"And I don't accept anything less than a hundred."

Tsuna shrugged. It would be a pain keeping his grades up, but it would be better than dying horridly at the hands of the self-proclaimed world's greatest hitman.

Plus, he could always use his math homework machine.

"And I won't let you use that interesting device you just created," Reborn added.

Damn.

**There you have it. I think I'll keep this as a one-shot for now. If people actually want me to, I'll probably continue. xD **


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I don't own KHR.**

**So, I decided to continue this. Hope I don't regret it… I have absolutely no plan for this fic- I guess I'm going to just go with it. **

_**De plus, Queen-Disturbed-Haruka a traduit ce fic en français. Vous pouvez trouver le lien sur ma profile.**_

* * *

Chapter 2

Tsuna tried his best to ignore the baby waddling on behind him as he made his way to school. When leaving the house, he had briefly considered taking the car, but then realized that sitting next to the baby would be even more uncomfortable than walking with him. At least if they were walking, Tsuna could stay a small distance away from the thing.

"You have a Biology test today," Reborn commented, glancing at a book doubtlessly filled with information about Tsuna. Tsuna didn't even want to know how he got all that stuff. "Get perfect or you'll be doing revision after school for a week."

_Well, he's nice. _Tsuna thought, pushing his hands into his pockets. _I wish that they was a way for me to get rid of him. But aside from outright threatening him, it's probably impossible. And there's no way I could do that... _

Reborn shot a somewhat suspicious look towards Tsuna. He had a lot of experience with reading faces, and despite Tsuna's pathetic attempts to hide his emotions, it was obvious that Tsuna wasn't happy with his new situation. Well, unfortunately for Tsuna, he was stuck with him.

Reborn wondered how Tsuna would deal with the little hot-headed Italian that he would undoubtedly run into today. If he had his robots, maybe he could win- but Reborn didn't think that Tsuna walked around with his robots.

* * *

Tsuna, for once in his life, was actually listening to the teacher rather than dozing off. He had History first block, one of his less… stellar courses. Usually he would just muddle his way through it, but now that he had a crazy home tutor on his case, Tsuna figured that it would be best to pay the slightest bit of attention.

"Listen up, class," the teacher, Tanaka-sensei, said cheerfully. "We have a new transfer student today, all the way from Italy! Come in, Gokudera-san."

The sliding door was slammed open, rattling the walls. A silver-haired boy strode into the room, slouched and angry. The whole class was taken aback by the boy's aggressive attitude.

"Um…" Tanaka-sensei said, letting out a nervous laugh. "Why don't you introduce yourself, Gokudera-san?"

Gokudera ignored the teacher in favor of stomping his way between the desks.

"Or you could… just do that, I guess," Tanaka-sensei muttered under his breath, too softly for anyone to hear. "Whatever. See if I care."

Gokudera headed straight towards Tsuna's desk, with the full intention to give the weakling a proper scare. Unfortunately, he wouldn't manage to accomplish his goal. He would instead trip and fall, his nose slamming painfully into the ground.

Laughter filled the room. Gokudera picked himself up, completely mortified. Completely forgetting his original goal to scare the candidate for the Tenth, he shuffled over to an empty desk.

Meanwhile, a small mouse-like robot rolled out from under Gokudera's feet, heading back towards its master. Tsuna picked it up with a smirk. Its original use was surveillance. However, it had strong armor, enough to withstand someone stepping on it. It was more than enough to trip up Gokudera.

That transfer student had looked as if he was heading straight towards Tsuna's desk. Couple that with the fact that he was from Italy… well, it was always better safe than sorry. It was a little too coincidental for his taste, having a transfer student from Italy coming the day after a Mafioso home tutor arrives.

Tsuna didn't believe in coincidences. Or rather, he thought that the odds of a coincidence occurring were relatively low.

He suddenly felt as though someone was watching him. Turning around, he had to let out a smile at the sight of Gokudera sending killer glares towards him. Sticks and stones would break his bones, but glares would never hurt him. That was the saying, right? Besides, what made him think that it was Tsuna that had tripped him up?

But if he cornered him after school, Tsuna would be in trouble. Gokudera seemed more than capable of breaking his bones. Casually sliding out a controller from his bag, he pushed a lime green button. A light blinked twice from behind the button, indicating that his robot had been activated and was heading towards the school. He had several pre-set locations that the robot would automatically head towards once he pressed the right button.

Sticking the controller back into his bag, he leaned back to listen to the teacher's blathering about the Warring Era.

* * *

Out of the two base instincts, fight or flight, Tsuna's initial response wasn't to fight. It was to flee. And unlike others, who tried to sugarcoat it by calling it a 'tactical retreat' or something to that nature, Tsuna fully admitted that he was fleeing- _running away_. He held no shame in it. Better flee than to fight and die/get severely injured.

That being said, fleeing was rather difficult when he was backed up against a concrete wall. He cursed his low physique. It had been impossible for Tsuna to avoid Gokudera.

"If a _weakling _like you becomes the Tenth, the Vongola is finished," Gokudera growled, slamming his hand above Tsuna's head.

"It's not like I want to be the Tenth," Tsuna murmured, staring at the hand with a nonchalant look. He winced as a cloud of cigarette smoke was blown into his face. "So, why do you care? You're a part of Vongola, I'm assuming?"

Gokudera ignored Tsuna's question. He instead continued on his rant. "_I'm _the one fit to be the Tenth. I've been observing you for a while-"

"Stalker," Tsuna muttered under his breath. Then again, he doubted that Gokudera had "observed" him that well, or he would've noticed Tsuna's robots. Most likely, Gokudera had just watched his everyday interactions in school.

"- and the most noteworthy thing I've noticed about you is your horrible physical ability," Gokudera snapped. "You're useless. Die."

"Hm… let me think about that." Tsuna put his finger on his cheek, pretending to think. When he noticed that Gokudera was grabbing what seemed to be _dynamite _from his jacket, Tsuna decided to speed things up a tad. "No. H27!"

Tsuna had a brief moment to savor the utterly confused look on Gokudera's face, before he was thrown into the wall by Tsuna's robot.

Tsuna languorously stepped towards and behind his robot, a satisfied smirk on his face. Gokudera, on the other hand, was slowly getting back up. Impressively, the dynamite was still in one of his hands.

"You know, waiting until the last minute is rather dangerous," Tsuna said mildly. "But really, it's worth it to see the expression on your face. You're almost as interesting as my robots right now."

Tsuna turned to face Gokudera, his smirk evolving into a wide grin.

"Almost," he said.

Gokudera stared at the bulky robot in front of him. It seemed to be around a metre and a half tall. Instead of legs, four wheels made up the bottom part of the robot. The upper section was composed of a large camera making up its head, and two large arms with rather large hands.

Tsuna's mouth twitched up into a smile, before he repressed it. He had to remain composed, or he wouldn't look _cool. _It was all about the rule of cool.

Gokudera slowly got up from the ground, balancing himself on the wall with one hand. He staggered for a second, before managing to stand up straight. Gokudera lit up the dynamite in his hand, scowling at Tsuna.

"Sorry, no." Tsuna shook his head with faux regret. "C27!"

One of the robot's arms shot out to secure Gokudera against the wall.

"Don't move, please." Tsuna smiled amiably. "I need you to ask you a couple questions."

Again, Tsuna resisted the urge to grin. He had to stay _composed. _

Gokudera's face was growing steadily redder and redder by the minute.

"Oh. Oops." Tsuna laughed nervously. "Sorry, I still haven't worked out all the little kinks. S27!"

The robot let Gokudera go. He dropped to the ground, breathing heavily.

"Who… who made that for you?" Gokudera snapped, eyeing Tsuna with an angry look. "Depending on someone else's help… you're the worst of the worst."

Tsuna raised an eyebrow. "Depending on someone else's help is a bad thing? But as it happens, _I _made that robot. Who sent you?"

"That's impossible," Gokudera said, whipping out his dynamite and lighting it. "Die already."

"P27!" Tsuna cried. The robot's arm attempted to punch Gokudera, but he managed to jump to the side and avoid the punch at the last moment.

Unfortunately, his dynamite wasn't so lucky. It fell to the ground at Gokudera's feet, still lit, and about to explode in a few seconds. He stared at the dynamite in mute shock.

Tsuna's eyes took in the scene in front of him. His mouth was open, about to shout a command, but then he realized something very, very, important.

Tsuna couldn't let that Italian delinquent die, but he couldn't let his robot get injured by the dynamite either. He would rather die.

That left him one choice.

Mentally cursing, he raced towards Gokudera and pushed him to the ground. The dynamite exploded behind them.

Tsuna winced, pain echoing throughout his body. He picked himself off Gokudera and looked towards his robot, panicked. When he realized that his robot was fine, he let out a sigh of relief and turned back towards Gokudera.

"You… you saved me. You could've used your robot, but you tried to save me _yourself_," Gokudera said, shell-shocked. "Why?"

"Oh, um…" Tsuna briefly considered telling him that it had less to do with him and more to do with not harming his robot. He shot that idea down instantly. Best to lie. "My body, um… moved by itself?"

Gokudera's shock melted away into a look of wonderment and worship. He instantly groveled onto the ground.

Tsuna raised an eyebrow.

"I was mistaken!" Gokudera cried, pushing his head into the ground. "You're most definitely fit to be the Tenth!"

He looked up towards Tsuna, his eyes shining. "I'll follow you anywhere, Tenth! Command me to do anything!"

"… Okay?" Tsuna said, more than a little confused by the 180® personality shift.

"It's a Family rule. The loser serves under the winner."

Gokudera and Tsuna both looked towards the source of the voice. Reborn was heading towards them.

"Let me guess… _you're _responsible for this guy attacking me," Tsuna said irritably.

"I called him to Japan, and told him that he could become the Tenth if he defeated you," Reborn said calmly. "That's all."

"Right. That's _all_," Tsuna muttered sarcastically. He really couldn't deal with all this. He wanted to get back to working the kinks out of his Defender27©.

"I'm the one who decided to test you, Tenth!" Gokudera exclaimed, his eyes still shining. "Reborn-san had no part in my decision. I didn't even really want to become the Tenth! It's just that when I heard that the new boss candidate was a Japanese guy the same age as me, I had to test him."

Tsuna placed his hand on his forehead and let out a groan.

"Let me get this right," he said. "You want to become my subordinate."

"Yes, of course!" Gokudera said.

"You should be happy," Reborn cut in. "You're gaining subordinates because of your strength."

"I don't need your comments. And I definitely don't need an idiot for a subordinate," Tsuna retorted. He grabbed his physics homework out of his bag.

_Or rather, I don't want subordinates at all._

"If you can solve questions 1 – 15 on page 135- correctly- in say, one minute." Tsuna made a show of looking at his watch. "You can be my subordinate. Here, pencil and paper."

Tsuna threw Gokudera the pencil and paper. He scrambled to catch it. But unfortunately, just when he had captured two items in his hands, a physics textbook clonked him on the head.

Tsuna resisted the urge to laugh. It wouldn't be nice.

"One minute," Tsuna repeated. "Are you ready?"

_He's a delinquent Mafioso. There's no way that he would know the faintest thing about physics._

Tsuna didn't bother to wait for an answer.

"Five, four, three, two, one…. Go."

Glancing up from his watch for a second, he noticed that Gokudera had gotten a pair of glasses from somewhere. They were lightly perched on his nose.

Tsuna was also surprised to see that Gokudera was actually trying to solve the questions. He suddenly felt uneasy for some reason. He dismissed the feeling quickly- it was completely illogical.

He had nothing to worry about.

"I'm finished, Tenth!" Gokudera exclaimed, jumping up. He handed Tsuna his answers and the textbook.

"Already? It's only been… fifty-three seconds…" Tsuna muttered. He accepted the paper and textbook, scanning the paper. His face grew steadily paler by the second.

"It's… you… you got it all right." Tsuna said. His face was utterly shell-shocked. "It's all correct. Hundred percent. No mistakes."

"Gokudera is a known genius." Reborn said, hopping onto Tsuna's shoulder. Tsuna shot a glare at him. "Looks like you have a subordinate now!"

Tsuna scowled and stuffed the paper and textbook back into his bag. On the bright side, his physics homework was finished for him. Never let an opportunity pass him by- that was his motto.

"Tenth, I was wondering… Did you really make that?" Gokudera nodded towards the robot. "And what was with the weird commands you were giving it?"

"Yes, I really made him." Tsuna looked up at 'him' with a bright smile. "I set up some commands based on English words. H is 'hit', S is 'stop', C is 'capture', P is 'punch', etc. The '27' means 'the enemy in front of me'. I haven't gotten the chance to set up more specific commands yet, or regulate the strength. Sorry for that, by the way. Are you alright?"

"I'm fine. I've had worse." Gokudera grinned at Tsuna. He noted the blood steadily dripping down Gokudera's forehead.

"_Had _worse… this mafia life is _sounding_ worse and worse by the minute…" Tsuna muttered. He sighed. He might as well make the best of the situation.

"What do you know about robotics?" Tsuna asked. He shot another glare towards Reborn, who was still on his shoulder.

"A little. I know more about the theoretics than the actual engineering," Gokudera answered. "Do you want me to help with… your robots, Tenth?"

"Small steps, Gokudera, small steps," Tsuna said. "You can start with fetching me parts, before I'll teach you how to help me with all my robots. Any 'subordinate' of mine needs to know all about robots."

He eyed Gokudera, with half a hope that he would give up on being his subordinate. No such luck.

"Of course, Tenth!" Gokudera had no objections.

"Right," Tsuna muttered. "And drop the 'Tenth' thing."

"No." Gokudera answered firmly.

Tsuna sighed.

Just what was he getting himself into?

Or rather, what was he being forced to get into?

* * *

**No Spanner in this chapter, sorry. Don't worry, the next chapter will be more Spanner-centric. **


End file.
